Three Beautiful Things

1. Waving off the last of our sleepover guests. Now we are free to be tired and grumpy. 2. A bunch of sweet peas -- bright stained glass colours -- tucked in among our packing. 3. The wheezy calls of the baby seagulls nesting in a chimney stack the next street over; and the swifts shrieking overhead.

1. Overnight shower has dampened the parched garden, left drops on the washing line and cooled the air. 2. Now we're sitting in the garden (we've left the supper table uncleared in the kitchen) I'm glad that I gave into an impulse and rolled a couple of tinned cocktails into my M&S basket. 3. I note in on my list and leave it alone for tomorrow.

1. My walk in the woods today is pied and dappled and splashed with light and shadow. 2. On a day when it's too hot and bright in full sun, to sit by an open door in vast, cool room. 3. When I am called for supper, my tracker shows me just how much work I have done today, and it feels like enough.

1. I love the coffee in jade green cups and saucers. 2. A schoolgirl doesn't have the busfare. The driver tells her that her pass will give her a free ride on the next bus. But a passenger pays her on. 'You're out late enough as it is.' 3. We are all aching for different reasons. Movement breaks have become a games night sacrament.

1. Opening the dishwasher and discovering that it is not full and clean as expected, so I don't need to empty it.  2. The new coffee has some enticingly complicated instructions with it. 3. Someone has been eating the jammy cakes I made, and there is only one left.

1. Our bank has given every customer £100, which is a pleasant thing to find in our accounts. 2. This edit of a sweet romantic novel is flying along -- and it's a Christmas book so the descriptions of cold weather are very welcome on a day when I've shuttered the west side of the house against the determined sun. 3. Three of us squashed on the sofa in the front room -- coolest spot in the house -- listening to the radio.

1. I thought I caught lime blossom last week while sitting out drinking coffee on the Pantiles, but it is early yet, and it was such a subtle scent coming and going on the air currents, so I put it down to a general feeling of happiness. But now I've definitely and unmistakably I've caught the faint fresh smell up on the common. 2. A glass of wine, a game and some talk and the day is rounded off. 3. The scent of jasmine has slipped through the back windows and rests in the dark rooms.

1. It's Palestrina week on Radio 3, and I'm very much showing up for hours and hours and hours of polyphony. 2. Through the trees, a glimpse of the mauve orchid spires among the grass on the other path. 3. I find the wide belt I have been looking for all day. I put it on. It isn't comfortable.

1. Folding and bruising herbs from the garden for snipping into the soup. 2. Cracking the top off a beer bottle -- refreshment to help with cooking supper. 3. The Early Music Show bases its playlist on the diary John Courtney, who lived in Yorkshire in the second half of the 18th century. With a cry of ‘musick is better than cards by far’, he leapt joyfully and with both feet into the local scene, both as a participant and a listener. He sounds like the sort of person whose enthusiasm encourages and cheers the creators, performers and artists around them, and it's a pleasure to see such a one remembered.

1. I've been sneaking off to read Bookshops and Bonedust  by Travis Baldree. It is very pleasant to disappear for a short time into a skilfully drawn seaside world. 2. Confirmation messages -- your parcel will arrive today; your taxi is on its way; it's outside; is that you trying to log in; we've got your order; your food is being prepared; it's been dispatched; it's at the door. It's a lot, but I value the constant background noise of reassurance; and I like to delete the lot at the end of the day. 3. Was braced for a bad news phone call; but it's only a small change, and nothing we can't deal with.

1. I stop for a moment to watch the wind shaking the grass heads in all their variety. I should, I suppose, try to learn them now I've noticed this array. 2. The fleshy colour and reddish cap of a jay on an oak branch over my head catches my eye. In the undergrowth, another bird is protesting with a call that sounds like knocking pebbles together. 3. Six black dots to the right of the path. Noses and wet shining eyes of two deer looking up from their grazing.

1. The shadow of a ladybird larva on a leaf above my head -- clinging on despite the wind's shaking. 2. Turn my head, at a blackbird's alarm. Catch sight of a buzzard launching itself out of the scrub. 3. Soothing lists of names and places in The Cattle Raid of Cooley as I am reading myself off to sleep.

1. Half-awake, half asleep, I can smell the heat on her curling wand. 2. The new prescription in my glasses is a large jump, and it's taking a bit of getting used to. Even a short walk or an hour of work leaves me feeling seasick. Luckily I've got six episodes of Letters from a Long Marriage  lined up so I don't mind taking half-hour breaks as needed. 3. We are talking about communicating better as parents, and the youth workers admit that they love hearing teen gossip and drama.

1. I'm here at the table distracting myself with my phone so that she can teach herself to cook in peace and security. 2. I grew these herbs and cut the stems and hung them up in the kitchen to dry. Now I'm breaking them into storage jars for tea and for cooking, and I'm thinking you don't get much volume of dried herb for that work. Meanwhile, in the garden, the mint has put up new growth, ready for cutting again. 3. Our red brick garden path is scattered with white daisy petals.

1. Rough night, slow start. Drinking tea and sitting quietly until I'm ready to begin.  2. Through the cracked open window, the soft persistent sound of summer rain. 3. As promised, once the table is cleared, we spend some of the evening bent over tiny sticker scenes, using tweezers to place minute cushions and little pandas in a library and a coffee shop.

1. From the path I spot a head-sized bright orange bracket fungus on a dead tree. I try to get in for a closer look, but the way is blocked by brambles and holly and rough ground. 2. We bury our noses in the pots of pinks, for their clove scent. 3. Deep in the night -- I can't sleep, but through the open window I can hear owls on the common.

1. A short-notice visit from an official causes a flurry of tidying. He almost certainly doesn't notice (which is good, because you'd want him to think we were always well-kempt and not paddling a sinking boat) but it is very pleasant for us after he has finished and gone to luxuriate in our ordered space. 2. While gossiping with a neighbour, I notice that a sweet pea vine, almost certainly related to the ones that I train up and over our fence, is twining itself around the litter bin across the road. 3. I join an hour-long online writing session and feel like I'm doing my real work (even though these early drafts feel a lot like play). Check out Tania Hershman's events and join us on the next one.

1. We walk and talk through dusty sunshine and dappled shade. 2. I did wash my hands before coming out, but they still smell of saffron from the dough I've been kneading. 3. A mysterious vinegary smell is more interesting than French vocab. We chase it down through the house to where Nick is treating a pan in the kitchen.

1. We make time to stare at art in the library -- the glow of red velvet caught in brushstrokes; the original cut up for patchwork a hundred years ago. 2. I stand up to straighten my back and rub at my wrists where the bristly leaves of green alkanet have irritated my skin, feeling unsure about my choice to let such a rampant weed have a little space in my garden for the sake of its twinkling blue flowers and early foliage. A bee with a bright red behind noses into one of the plants, finding value in even a tiny taste of nectar. 3. Look up, see swifts.